AWAKE (a review)

AWAKE
(a review)

This is the kind of movie writers love and audiences hate. Why? It's that cool concept self-contained thriller that writers can generate heat with, but almost never live up to the hype...and with self-contained thrillers if the thriller part isn't really cool then there isn't going to be anything else -- no big action scenes, no great comedy bit, nada. And because the love interest is Jessica Alba there's no nudity. Instead there's just a lot of build up that doesn't have much suspense and a lame resolution with no emotion.


The concept is that this super rich guy (Hayden Christiansen) is getting a heart transplant but for some reason instead of going to sleep he stays completely conscious. Then he realizes someone is trying to kill him while he is on the operating table. Luckily, he not only is conscious (so he can feel pain) but can walk around like a ghost/astral projection as he tries to unravel the mystery of who is killing and save himself.

Not a bad concept. Actually, pretty damn cool. Good enough that I'm jealous I didn't think of it. Unfortunately, the actually movie is bad enough that I'm not that jealous (except for the fact that he got a movie made with name actors and I'm sitting on my broke a** in my crappy studio apartment).

Let me hit some problems. (This will be SPOILER heavy, but seriously the movie is lame enough you won't really care if you know.) First, there's the mystery of who's killing him. Except it isn't really a mystery. We find out pretty fast who is in on it. There's only one question -- his wife (Alba) -- will she find out what is happening or is she in on it? Unfortunately even that is told to us pretty quickly. So the only real mystery is will he save himself and the answer, unfortunately, is no. That's right -- no. That's the problem of him being astral projection guy -- he can walk around and listen (and for some reason flash back to his past a lot) but he can't actually do anything.

(the movie Jessica Alba should make)

So we have a thriller where the protagonist doesn't really do anything, where there isn't much mystery and none of that other fun stuff -- action scenes, supernatural scares, comedy, nudity, etc, etc. And it gets worse -- there is this subplot where the protagonist is worried about living up to the man his father was. Turns out he killed his father, who was yelling at his mom...and that's supposed to be the big emotional 3rd act moment. Like killing your father is a good thing. Way to go son. (Or maybe not...I wasn't paying that close attention by the end.)

Which isn't to say there isn't anything interesting in the movie. Just the moment where Christiansen is on the table aware and able to feel pain and they begin to cut into him is pretty cool. And for such a contained concept they actually come close to pulling it off. The emotional element of Christiansen living up to his father was pretty empty and they give away the mystery too soon, but if they hadn't they might have gotten a pretty fun little thriller out of it.

--Paul